Facebook’s disastrous day on Wall Street was historically bad

Facebook lost more value today (July 26) than any other publicly traded US company ever.

Its share price began to tank in after-hours trading last night when the company posted second-quarter earnings that came in below analysts’ expectations. Then chief financial officer David Wehner said recent adjustments and challenges to Facebook’s business, many a result of a scandal-scarred past few months and years, could have a negative impact on revenue for the next few quarters. And the stock price sank even further.

Shares barely recovered during daytime trading hours today, closing  at $176.26, a drop of about 19% from yesterday’s Nasdaq close of $217.50. The price drop resulted in the single-worst one-day fall in a company’s market capitalization in Wall Street history, plummeting from $631.2 billion on July 25 to $511.5 billion, according to Sentieo. CEO Mark Zuckerberg is reported to have lost around $11 billion in his personal worth.

It’s the fourth massive drop in market cap for traded companies in 2018, with the year now accounting for one-third of the 12 largest drops ever, according to FactSet. The previous record-holder for the largest drop was Intel in September 2000, and prior to that, Microsoft in April of that year—the height of the dot-com bust.

But we’re definitely not in a bubble, no siree.